Are the banks ready for total outsourcing/commoditisation of their DBA teams?
For the last few years, financial institutions have embraced “follow the sun” support model. The objective is to provide the best customer support, without paying the standard hefty price tag if the 24/7 support had been provided by local UK staff. UK teams have enjoyed the support of remote teams in North America, Brazil, India and China.
This has been adopted by many functions within the organisation, including DBA teams.
At the beginning, the tasks trusted to the remote DBAs have been straightforward. Maintain smooth running of a database, mainly backups, space management.
UK DBAs would still perform other tasks, such as installations, new database server configuration, database upgrades, RAC configurations, standby database setups.
However, as years go on, remote outsource DBAs have strengthen their staff, and with their increased experience and knowledge, they are ready to taken on more and more responsibility. Outsourced teams have the challenge of retaining valuable members of staff, who are hungry to do more interesting things, who are no longer content to be asked to perform routine day to day support functions.
And why can’t they? Why wouldn’t remote outsource DBAs perform server configurations, database installations, upgrades, RAC, standby, you name it.
Would this mean there is no more valid requirements for financial institutions to have local DBA teams in the UK? With the fast broadband available around the world, it no longer matters when one sits when providing the support functions.
With the economic downturn, surely this question has been asked both by the management team, as well as by the UK DBAs themselves. And if the individual DBAs are not prepared to bring more value to differentiate themselves from their counterparts in India or China, they are right to be worried about their job security.
However, organisations should encourage and support their DBAs to help the banks get value out of their investment in Oracle.
What advantage do UK DBAs have over their remote counterparts? In my opinion, the answer is: close proximity to the users. They should leverage this advantage by building close relationships with the business. As outsourced DBAs are getting really good technically, UK DBAs should emphasise on improving their skills that can only be gained through close interaction with application/business users. Something that can not easily be picked up through standard training courses.
A lot DBAs express their frustration on the quality of Oracle implementations delivered by development team. Well, now there is no better time to change that around. Muck in.
If I am running a Global DBA team and looking to save cost and maintain quality, I would certainly continue and increase the use of outsourced team to provide reliable 24/7, and support the UK individuals who are ready to embrace the outsourcing culture and push themselves out of their comfort zone, try to understand challenges that are faced by the business, the application, and the development team, and use their expertise in Oracle to help the banks run better.
Hi Hilda,
Interesting post.
But why are you assuming the business users are in the UK? I don’t think London is exactly forging ahead right now in sophisticated end users of financial applications..
Why cannot your argument be extended to a more global perspective on where true expertise lies? How does your argument play out for a Dubai based financial institution for example - or Beijing?
Nigel
Hi Nigel,
I admit I was writing this piece more from the point of view of London, i.e. where I am currently based. But it is a fact that London has long been the centre of IT excellence, where a lot of new IT initiatives for the large financial institutions are started in London.
But you can take the same point of view and it will stand true regardless of the geographic aspect. Or I think it is anyway
The question isn’t where the IT expertise is - in my opinion?
As you so rightly say the value is produced by proximity to users - and this is where outsourcing so often fails.
As you point out the obvious fall back is following the sun - to get low cost high standard IT support - but what we need to generate value is the close dialog with the business.
My teaser was - what will happen when the financial hubs are no longer NY and London - but rather exactly the centers that we are currently looking for low cost technical support - to quote your Blog “Brazil, India and China”
I think we would all acknowledge that these countries have every potential to become economic powerhouses of tomorrow - I wonder if we in the old world have the talent to become their IT outsourced centers of excellence.
I very much doubt it!